Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 11th of November 2020

Case name: 2020_11_01-WM518
Situation: 11-13 travelers started from Aïn Bénian, Algeria. Contact was lost for six days. Contact re-established on the 7th and rescue to Valencia, Spain. At least two fatalities.
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Western Mediterranean Sea

Summary of the Case:
On 1st of November 2020 at 22:54h CET, the Alarm Phone received a call from a friend of somebody on a boat with 11-13 travelers in distress. There were no women and children among them. According to the friend, the group had started from Aïn Bénian, Algiers in Algeria, heading towards Ibiza in a grey and yellow zodiac. We did not receive a GPS location. The friend passed us a phone number on board, and at 23:34h CET, we tried to reach the travelers, but without success. At 00:15h CET, we informed the Spanish Search and Rescue organization Salvamento Marítimo (SM) of Las Palmas de Mallorca via e-mail. At 00:42h CET, we reached SM Palma de Mallorca on the phone and learned of two landings of 11 people each, to Ibiza and to Mallorca, the day before. The next morning, we informed the friend of the travelers about this. As we lacked the information when exactly the travelers had started their journey, we were not sure if one of the landings could be them. We still could not reach the travelers directly. At 14:30h CET, the friend passed us the information from the families of the missing people that the groups who had arrived in Spain, were not them. At 16:20h CET, we called the Rescue Coordination Centre (RCC) on Las Palmas de Mallorca. They informed us about a boat that was just arriving in the port of Ibiza, but they did not have information about the number of travelers. At 21:00h CET, we called them again, but could not clarify if our case was among the rescues of the day. Our shift teams could not find out more until the afternoon of the next day (3rd of November). At 17:00h CET, we received a new contact number to another family member of the missing. They did not have any news, either. We called SM Madrid and SM of the Balearic Islands, asking for news, but neither of them could pass us detailed information that could match our case. They reported of many rescues of travelers starting from Algeria in the past days. At 18:20h CET, we received the name from someone on the boat. At 18:47h CET, we investigated further, by calling the Guardia Civil of Almería and their press service, but without any results. During the night, the travelers themselves were still not reachable. The next morning (4th of November) at 09:26h CET, our shift team tried to call different authorities on Ibiza, but they were not reachable. At 10:30h CET, we talked to the RCC Palma de Mallorca and learned again about several arrivals during the last days. We sent them an e-mail with the name we had received, the phone number and the other information we had. At 12:47h CET, the friend who had alerted us in the first place, did not have any news. At 13:18h CET, we received an e-mail from SM Las Palmas, informing us that they had requested information about our case at the Immigration Department of the Spanish police. During the whole day, the travelers themselves were still not reachable. Our shift teams could not find out more during the next two days. On the 6th of November, we were in touch with the brother of one of the travelers. He had received a message from the boat, saying that it was still out at sea. This day, we received calls from several family members and friends asking for information about the boat, and our shift team received several new phone numbers on board. None of them was reachable. At 17:57h CET, one of the phone numbers on board was ringing. This let us conclude that the phone was turned on in an area of phone coverage. At 18:26h CET, we talked to RCC Palma de Mallorca and passed them the news from our side, also by e-mail. On the 7th of November, according to the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (MRCC) Madrid, there were still no news from the boat. At 20:42h CET, our shift team received a message from a relative of someone on the boat: according to them, the travelers were 56km away from the Spanish coast, close to Alicante. At 21:10h CET, we informed the RCC Palma de Mallorca via phone call. At 21:43h CET, we received GPS coordinates from another relative. We passed all info via e-mail to the Spanish coastguard at 21:55h CET. At 21:56h CET, we talked to the RCC Las Palmas. They informed us that there was a fishing vessel close to the position we had sent them and that a Search and Rescue operation was started. At 22:15h CET, they updated us that the estimated time of arrival was in two hours. Within the next hour, we received updates on the GPS location from the relative and forwarded them to RCC Las Palmas. At 23:11h CET, they informed us that a patrol boat had arrived to the boat. There were nine travelers on board. At 23:40h CET, a relative confirmed the rescue. According to them, two people had lost their lives during the journey. At 23:50h CET, we called SM Valencia, who were in charge of the rescue, and they confirmed the rescue of nine people in a yellow and grey zodiac. This fitted the description of the boat of our case. At 00:12h CET, another relative reported to just have talked to his nephew on board who had confirmed the rescue by the Spanish coastguard. At 00:44h CET, we passed the names of the travelers to SM Valencia. At 04:44h CET, they called us back and confirmed that the rescued people were the ones of our case, but one name we had passed them was missing. The travelers were brought to Valencia, but it remains unclear, what exactly happened to the missing people during their journey.